New Set Photos from ‘The Green Hornet’ — and Nic Cage is Out as the Villain

When Sony started fleshing out the cast for The Green Hornet beyond Seth Rogen, I was a little shocked how big they were going: Cameron Diaz as the love interest? Nicolas Cage as the villain? Cool!

Well, half cool. Nicolas Cage had never fully signed on — he was “in negotiations” — and those negotiations just fell through. He’s out.

Now that the movie has finally started filming — it was in pre-production forever because Stephen Chow, who originally signed onto direct and co-star as the Green Hornet’s sidekick Kato, stepped down as the director, then waited a few months, then stepped down as Kato — you can bet they won’t waste any time finding a replacement for Cage. I’m talking within a week, maybe even tomorrow.

Since they wanted Cage, I’m assuming the villain is pretty over-the-top. So they need a great character actor who’s willing to go mainstream for a paycheck — think Sam Rockwell in Charlie’s Angels.

May I suggest Steve Buscemi? Supposedly he’s got two movies in pre-production, but surely he could take a month right now to film for Hornet, right?

While I’m at it, here are a bunch of set photos that surfaced earlier this week: